From: Vickie Moseley

Subject: Moving On

SUMMARY: Mulder has to clean out his father's house and gets an
unexpected visit. Introspection and angst involved.

WARNINGS: Slight reference to Third Season opener. No romance, no
violence, Rated G.

Standard Disclaimer: No copyright infringement intended, all this stuff
belongs to somebody else (namely 10-13 productions and nuclear silos,
inc.) and don't try to sell this story to anybody because me and Mr.
Carter will hunt you down like a dog!

Archive on newsgroup and anywhere else you might want.

Send me comments, I live for mail :)

MOVING ON by Vickie Moseley <mailto:vmoseley@fgi.net>

William Mulder Residence West Tisbury, Massachusetts June 23, 1995 12:30pm

Fox Mulder stood on the sidewalk and looked grimly up at the house
before him. He had dreaded this moment for weeks. It had been over 3
months since he had last set foot in the house. That night, his father
had called him, and he had driven here in the middle of the night,
drugged and with a fever, to talk. It was the first *real* talk he had
ever had with his father as an adult. It was also the night his father
had been murdered.

He remembered every second of that night, even though his mind had been
clouded by psychotropic drugs. He could still feel his father's embrace
when he met him at the door. It was the first embrace he had gotten from
his father since the day after Samantha had been taken, he considered.
It was the last embrace he would ever receive, as well. He remembered
the look of fear in his father's eyes, the look of resignation to a
horrible truth, the look of guilt and ultimately, how his eyes begged
his son for forgiveness. It had been frightening for Mulder, who had
never been allowed to be an adult in his father's presence. It had been
painful to be the grown up, even when all their encounters had ended in
pain. He shoved the thoughts aside and walked purposefully up the steps
to the porch.

His mother had offered to come and help. He had spent the last few days
with her, going through papers, settling the estate. Even though they
had been divorced for over twenty years, his father had bequeathed
everything to Mulder and his mother. There were insurance papers, and
property settlements, funeral bills to be paid. Somehow, his mother had
actually risen to the challenge. She had a bright mind and an eye for
detail, two attributes that she had handed down to her son. But she also
had worked as a secretary following her divorce, and doing the paperwork
made her feel productive, took the edge off the grief she was trying so
hard to hide from her son. After all, how do you grieve for an *ex* spouse?

He didn't want her to have to clean out the house. That would have been
too much for her. Doing paperwork, she could remain objective. Going
through personal effects, deciding what items to keep, sell or throw
away--that would have torn her apart. So Mulder had made up an excuse.
He needed the time to himself, he had assured her. He wanted to do this.
She would only get in his way. And she had respected his wishes enough
to agree, even though he suspected that she knew his real motives. He
appreciated the fact that she didn't push him on this.

He unlocked the door and winced at the heat and stuffiness that greeted
him. The windows had been closed for the last three months. He moved
around the rooms, opening up the windows and doors, letting the cool
breeze off the shore flow through the house and cleanse the air. Then,
he went back out to his car and started bringing in empty packing boxes
and garbage bags. There was no way to put it off any longer. He made the
executive decision to start in the living room.

The bookcase was full of hardbacks. He noticed with some amusement a
library book from Oxford that had somehow managed to get caught up in
his suitcase one year. He had never remembered to return it. He opened
the cover and read the due date: 22 May 1980. That would make the book
15 years and 32 days overdue. At 12p a day, that would come to. . .a
*lot* of money! Ah well, he probably now qualified as a felon in Great
Britain. He smiled and put the book in the bottom of one of the 'save'
boxes. Might as well 'die as a sheep than as a lamb' one of his
professors had once told him. The cliche made no sense at the time, but
it seemed to apply here.

The rest of the books had been his father's. He looked at each title and
tried to weigh whether he might ever get the chance or incentive to read
it. Most of the books ended up in the box he was planning to donate to
the local library. He did keep a few, some of them books his father had
used in college. Then he found the little book on the bottom shelf. It
wasn't displayed with the spine forward, but had been flat against the
back, with other books hiding it. His heart skipped a beat as he picked
it up and held it for a moment. /Fox in Sox/ by Dr. Seuss. He suddenly
was having trouble breathing. He opened the book slowly and looked at
the childish scrawl across the inside cover. "To Sammy. Happy 5th
Birthday. Love, Fox."

He had no idea that his father had kept that book. He remembered all too
well the circumstances surrounding it's purchase. Every Saturday of his
childhood, he remembered his mother walking him to the library in town
to get three books. Just three, because that was the librarian's limit
for children. And he would rush home and read them, usually in one
afternoon. Then he would reread them, even though he had them memorized
the first time. When Samantha came along, however, one book became a
constant. /Fox in Sox/. It was a tongue-twister's nightmare and his
mother hated to read it to them, so he would usually do the honors.

When the time came for Sam's fifth birthday, his father took him into
the city to get her present. Just Fox and his father, no mother, no
little sister. Just the men. They searched a couple of clothing stores
to no avail when they stumbled on a bookstore. The inspiration struck
both of them at the same time and together, they searched the shelves to
find the title. After all these years, he had forgotten that day, how
special it was, how close he felt to his father--like they were actually
on the same wavelength, for once. He choked back tears and gently placed
the book in the save box.

There weren't many pictures to deal with. One picture, taken on a
vacation to the Grand Canyon, had his father and mother in the back, Sam
and himself in the foreground. Everyone was smiling. They looked like
any family on vacation. At the time, they had been *any* family.
Samantha was taken just months later. He put that with the save box.
Another, which almost surprised him, was his own graduation picture from
Oxford. His father hadn't bothered to come to the ceremony. It had
disappointed him at the time that his father failed to show. Business.
Always business. And England was so far away. But he hadn't bother to
attend his graduation from the FBI Academy, either, and that would have
been much closer to home. It still hurt to feel the rejection. He put it
in the save box, as well. His mother might want it.

Then, he picked up the last picture. It was a young man and a young
woman, sitting on a dock with the ocean in the background. It took him a
minute to realize it was his mother and his father. From the looks of
it, they must have been in their early twenties. It struck him that he
had not even been born, his parents had been married almost 8 years when
he arrived on the scene. They looked so young. They looked so much in
love. His parents in love, that was an alien concept. They had been
affectionate when Sam had been around, and he knew his father cared for
his mother even after the divorce, but love? That was too much to hope
for. He put the picture in the save box, but this one he would keep for
himself. He had room for it on his own bookshelf, right above the fish
tank.

He made it through the rest of the room rather quickly. There wasn't
much in the way of knickknacks, just a few ash trays, which he
unceremoniously dumped in the trash bags. The drapes and the furnishings
would be sold at an estate sale. He just barely had room in his
apartment for himself and his own furniture, he certainly didn't have
room for his father's stuff, too. The kitchen went just as easily. His
father had an electric can opener that Mulder decided to give to Scully.
He was tired of going over to her house and having to struggle with her
'low tech' model. He debated whether to keep the coffee maker. It was
actually rather new, with a timer and his was getting pretty beaten up.
Finally, he opted to keep it. By the time he had gone through the
cabinets, he had taken two big trash bags out to be picked up by the
trash haulers and had three big boxes for the sale.

There were closets of clothes, and he had to go through the pockets
before donating them to charity. He did save a couple of ties that were
a great deal more conservative than his own. That would definitely shake
up Scully if he came in with a 'normal' tie, he considered
mischieviously. All that was left was the old trunk in the corner. Its'
lock was rusty, but finally popped open with some gentle tugging and
prodding. The insides smelled musty. There was a bundle of letters, tied
with packing twine. The addresses were in his mother's script. Slowly he
untied the string and pulled one of the letters out of the yellowing
envelope. &lt;My dearest William, It seems like years since I've seen
your face, but I conjure it up every night just before I fall asleep. .
.&gt; Mulder swallowed hard, the lump in his throat had grown to the
size of an apple. Should he give these to his mother? How much would it
hurt her to remember the days when she and his father were so much in
love that she could 'conjure' up his face? How much might it help her
accept how much they once loved each other, accept his death and let
herself grieve? "All those psychology classes, and you can't even help
your mother with her grief. Oxford should revoke your degree!" he
muttered out loud. He placed the letters on the top of the books he
intended to keep.

The rest of the trunk contained even more mysteries. Yearbooks from MIT,
where his father had gone to college. A playbill from a production of
'The Fantasticks' on Broadway. He had never considered his father the
*musical type*. His mother must have chosen that one. He could imagine
her, the girl in the picture, teasing and conjoling her beau into taking
her to a Broadway musical. In a fleeting moment, he wondered if his
parents had sex before they were married. A bright blush rose in his
cheeks at the thought and he swept it from his mind.

A brown leather square caught his attention. It was wedged in the corner
next to the yearbooks. He pulled it out and stared in astonishment. It
was a wallet, crudely made. It was the wallet he had made at summer camp
when he was 10. Stamped on the outside were the initials W. M. Fox had
been so proud of that wallet. He had given it to his father the minute
they came to pick him up. And his father had taken it and immediately
pulled out his own wallet, moving money, pictures and drivers license
into the 'new' one. Then, he had ceremoniously put the new wallet back
in his pocket and handed his son the old one. Mulder had used the old
wallet for a long time. His heart was back in his throat again.
&lt;Don't do this to yourself,&gt; he chided silently. &lt;It only hurts
because you're thinking about it. Put it out of your mind and you can
get through this.&gt; Still, he put the homemade wallet in the save carton.

He got through the rest of the trunk. The 'save' carton was almost full.
The other cartons, he closed up with the strapping tape he had brought
with him and set them in neat piles near the front door, each marked in
black magic marker with it's appointed destination. He looked
appreciatively at the stack of boxes and the emptiness of the house
around him. Thank heaven's his father wasn't the *pack rat* his son had
always been. He couldn't say the process had been painless, but at least
it wasn't taking forever.

All that was left was the basement. He had only been down there once or
twice since his father had purchased the house. There couldn't be much
down there, but he had promised the real estate agent that all personal
belongings would be removed before she arrived on Monday, so he had to
go down and make a final check. After that, he could load up the boxes,
drop off the ones he wasn't keeping and grab a pizza before heading to
his mother's for the night. First thing in the morning he intended to
hightail it back to Washington in time to spend Sunday afternoon
sprawled on his couch, soaking up baseball, beer and sunflower seeds. He
deserved it after this week.

The steps down to the basement were too narrow for his feet. Halfway
down, he almost slipped off the step and took a tumble, but he was able
to catch himself just in time. &lt;Great, Mulder! Scully would just
*love* to come get you out of a hospital on the weekend. You would
*never* live that one down.&gt; he chided himself. He made it the rest
of the way down the steps without further incident and looked around the
darkened room by the light of a single 40 watt bulb hanging at the far
end of the room.

There was nothing in the basement except a tool box in the far corner.
He sighed heavily. It was a good sized tool box, probably worth
something. He had absolutely no place for it in his apartment. Maybe he
could donate it to someone, Habitat for Humanity or *someone*. He was so
intent on how to dispose of the tool box that he forgot completely *why*
he never ventured into the basement. But it became painfully obvious in
just a few seconds.

Now, Mulder's eiditic memory stored all sorts of useful and useless
information. And it usually supplied him with any item in the blink of
an eye, less than a nanosecond, as it were. But there had been times
when pain had totally obliterated his ability to store important
information in an easily retrievable manner. So he had forgotten the
beam. It was the main beam of the house, running the length of the
basement. It was about 12 inches high, a good 8 inches deep, and was
made of time tempered oak. Since the house was over 70 years old, the
beam, a good piece of New England hard wood, was the consistency of
concrete. And its' bottom edge was exactly 5 feet 9 inches off the stone
floor of the basement.

Fox Mulder stood 6 foot in his stocking feet. So the inevitable
collision was unavoidable. But the last time he had connected with the
beam, he had his head bent, for some unknown reason, and just glanced
off the edge. That had resulted in a deep gash on his scalp, and a nice
little headache that eventually subsided with a couple of aspirin and a
beer. This time, however, in the far too dim light of the only bulb,
Mulder was totally erect and hit the nearly invisible beam with full
force. In the galactic battle of man over matter, the beam won. Once he
connected with the beam, he fell absolutely straight back and hit the
back of his head on the stone floor of the basement with the sickening
sound a melon makes when it hits the pavement and breaks open. Mulder
was knocked out cold.

His first impression when he gained consciousness was that the basement
seemed much brighter. Almost too bright. He hadn't noticed that the
walls were white. They had been grey before. He shook his head to clear
the fog and immediately regretted the motion. Bright flashes of light
and blinding pain seared into his brain. &lt;Mulder, you have a
concussion,&gt; he could hear Scully's voice, in her best *doctor* tone.
Then he felt a hand on his shoulder, gently pushing him back onto the
cool floor of the basement. "Scully?" he whispered.

"Lie still, son. You probably have a concussion. Just be still." The
voice was above and behind him. It was a husky voice, a smoker's voice.
It was his *father's* voice.

"Dad?" Mulder asked, surprised. "Is that you?"

"Yes, Fox. It's me. Now just lie still, you're hurt." His father voice
sounded loving and concerned. He hadn't heard that tone in a long time,
in over 22 years.

"I'm OK, dad. I get hit on the head all the time. I'll be fine," he
assured his father. It was at once comforting and uncomfortable to have
his father worry about his health. But the hand wouldn't move from his
shoulder, it wouldn't let him up. "Dad, you know you're dead, don't
you?" Mulder finally had to ask.

There was a soft chuckle. "Yes, Fox, I know I'm dead. It's a hard thing
to forget. . ." his voice trailed off.

Mulder was lost for a time in his own painful recollections of the night
of his father's murder. Then, the memories that he'd stumbled on just
that afternoon came crashing in on his thoughts like waves on the shore.

"I found /Fox in Sox/, Dad. I had no idea that you kept it all these
years," he said, trying hard to keep his voice from cracking.

"I was hoping to give it back to her," the older Mulder said sadly.
"Now, I hope you'll do that for me."

His throat constricted tightly and Mulder was almost unable to say the
words. "I will, Dad. When I find her, I will."

"What else did you find, son," Bill asked softly, all the while his hand
tenderly stroking his son's forehead.

"Oh, a lot of stuff. A book I forgot to return to school."

"That must be worth a fortune in fines," the older man chuckled. "Don't
plan on any trips to the British Isles anytime soon."

"I won't, Dad. And I found that wallet I made you at camp."

"Ah, yes. My wallet. I was hoping you'd find that. But then, I hope you
receive one like it someday, from your own little one."

Mulder frowned. "Not much chance of that, Dad."

His father laughed easily. "Oh, I wouldn't be too sure. Just when you
least expect it, love will hit you over the head with a sledge hammer. I
know. It happened to me."

"You really loved Mom, didn't you?" Mulder asked gently.

"I love her still, son. No past tense about it. I love her still.=
Though I don't think she'll ever forgive me."

That brought Mulder back to the topic that had been utmost on his mind
in the recent months. A question he'd been burning to ask.

"Dad, I read the MJ files. I know you were involved with the Roswell
findings, that you were involved in the coverups. Dad, why did you let
them take Sam?" He couldn't stop himself, he had to let his father know
what he knew, he had to find out the truth.

"I figured you would find out, the night you were here last. I wanted to
tell you myself, Fox, but there wasn't time. God, if I could have had
just a little more time," William sighed, sounding sad and ancient. "And
for the record, I did not 'let them take Sam"! That was not the deal."

"Was the deal for them to take me, instead," Mulder hissed, his voice
filled with resentment.

"NO! That's wasn't the deal. I couldn't. I told them no, that I wouldn't
let them have either of you. Not for anything, not for anything in the
world. Son, they threatened your mother," William said in almost a
whisper. "I told them I would do anything they wanted but I would not
trade your life for mine. And they seemed satisfied. They told me that
as long as I kept the secret, all would be fine, you would all be safe."
A soft sobbed escaped his lips. "And I believed them, . . I believed. . ."

"Then why did they take her!" Mulder demanded, and regretted the action
almost immediately. The pain in his head was echoing through every part
of his body and he feared he would pass out again.

"I. Don't. Know!" his father cried, angrily. "God in Heaven, don't you
think I've asked that question a million times! But once they took her,
I knew you and your mother weren't safe, either. Not as long as you
meant anything to me. As long as I loved you, let them know I loved you,
you were both in danger. Can't you see that? Can't you understand?!"

"I've been in danger my whole adult life, Dad. Why didn't you tell me
this before?" Mulder sighed.

"Do I have to remind you that when I *did* try to tell you, I got
killed, son," William retorted. "You have no idea how I felt when I was
told you had the MJ files. I was terrified. Yes, I was frightened you
would find out my involvement. And I prayed you wouldn't figure out why
Sam had been taken. I didn't want you to think less of me than you
already did. But more importantly, I was afraid of what that knowledge
would do to endanger you! The men who kept that secret have no problem
killing people who get in their way. I know, I was one of them once. I
never pulled any triggers, but I had full knowledge of some of the
'elimination's' that occurred in the name of 'national security'! And I
was certain that they would kill you just for possessing the cassette,
even more so if you actually deciphered it! But I also knew you would
not stop until you found out all you could. Or until they succeeded.
Thank God they didn't succeed."

"They came pretty damn close, Dad," Mulder grumbled. "I ended up in a
boxcar, almost burned alive."

"I know, son, I saw. But close only counts in horseshoes and nuclear
war, Fox. You are alive. You've got a couple of big goose eggs on your
head at the moment, but you are alive. And you still have your work. I
know it hurt you deeply to come so close and lose it all again, but
believe me, son, it was for the best. If the knowledge had been made
public, you would never have been left alive."

"So what now, dad? I go back to my little office in the basement and
pretend nothing happened? What do I do now? How long do I have to search
for Sam? I know she's out there, but where? How do I find her?" Mulder
impatience was growing the longer the conversation lasted.

"You continue doing what you are doing. Son, you want to be a bulldozer.
You want to come crashing in against the wall and watch in crumble to
dust before you. Don't you realize, you are much better suited to be
water. Water runs over stone and carries a speck off at a time. Remember
the trip we took to the Grand Canyon? That enormous canyon, all the work
of water. A tiny trickle. And with time, it cut through mountains. In
time son, in time your truth will be revealed. In time, you'll find
Samantha, I have complete faith that you will. Everything in it's own
time." The older man's tone had become that of a loving teacher. It was
the first time Mulder had heard him use that tone of voice with him
since Samantha's disappearance.

"Why did you blame me, dad?" Mulder asked suddenly. "I was just a little
kid, what could I have done to save her? Why did you blame me?"

The older man was silent for a time. Mulder could still feel the hand
resting on his shoulder, keeping him prone on the cold cement floor of
the basement. Then he heard a heavy sigh. "I don't really know why I
blamed you, son. I often wish I knew. It was a shock. I thought you, all
of you were safe. . .it was just so hard to accept. Why did they take my
little girl? She was my baby. I can still feel her in my arms, how her
head fit in the palm of my hand and her feet didn't even reach to my
elbow when we brought her home from the hospital. It just hurt so much
to think that they took her from me, not knowing what happened, not
knowing if she were alive or. . . Fox, I know it wasn't your fault. But
I was so angry. Angry at myself. Angry that I couldn't protect her, that
I wasn't there to stop them. And you. . .you just stood there and
reflected every guilty thought I had within me. So I lashed out. You
reminded me just how much I had failed her, how much I could come to
fail you. It became a vicious circle of guilt and pain." He sighed
again. "God, how sorry I am. I never meant to hurt you. You're my son.
My only son. I love you so much, Fox," he said, his voice choking with
tears unshed. "And I always will," he whispered. "I just so sorry. . .
so very, very sorry."

Mulder was crying. "I'm sorry, too, dad. I'm sorry we couldn't have this
talk when you were alive, when we could have done something about it. I
wish we had a second chance. . ." he shook his head to erase the tears
and the pain behind his eyes exploded, pushing him into darkness.
&lt;Definitely a concussion,&gt; was his last thought before he blacked
out.

*****************

"Mulder! Mulder, wake up! Mulder, you have to wake up right now, or I
call an ambulance and you *know* how much you hate riding in an
ambulance. I mean it, Mulder. I'm dialing, 9 - 1 - . . ." the voice was
so insistent, he had to pay attention to it. And that could only be one
voice: it was Scully.

He didn't bother to open his eyes, but used all his strength to reach up
to the sound of the voice and grab whatever was handy. His hand caught
her wrist. Slowly he opened his eyes. He was still lying on the basement
floor. The glare off the dim bulb was still too much for his eyes and he
clamped them shut again.

"Oh, no you don't! Open those baby hazels this minute! I want to check
you out!" Scully intoned, in her best no-nonsense voice. He opened them,
but held up his arm to shield them from the light. It didn't matter.
Scully took that opportunity to shine her little maglight into his eyes,
making him flinch and sending splinters of light and pain through his
head. "Damn it all, Scully, get that light out of my eyes," he moaned.

"Wow, Mulder! I couldn't have done better with the butt of my gun.
That's a nice little concussion you have there, maybe a skull fracture.
Can you stand up?" Without waiting for his response, she slid her hands
under his shoulders and helped him into a sitting position. He wavered,
but finally made it up on his feet. He was wobbly, and she led him over
to the steps before he slid down out of her grip.

"What are you doing here, Scully? It's Saturday," he felt it necessary
to state the obvious while trying to make the stars stop dancing around
his head.

"Not exactly, Mulder. It's Sunday. When you didn't show up at your
mother's last night, she got worried. She was afraid to come over here
herself, and she didn't want to involve the police. The phone has been
disconnected and you left your cell phone at your apartment. She called
me as a last resort. So I got dressed and drove up here to find you. The
front door was open, I called, but you didn't answer. I searched the
whole house before I finally found you here, passed out on the floor.
How are you feeling?" she asked, noticing that he was turning a peculiar
shade of green.

"Like I'm gonna throw up," he said, as he had just enough energy to get
him up the stairs and into the kitchen where a mop bucket served to meet
his needs.

When he had finished, Scully was waiting with a wet paper towel to press
against the back of his head and on the gash that been opened on his
forehead. "Come on. We better get you over to the emergency room. You
probably need a stitch or two in that cut and I want an X-ray, just to
make sure you didn't fracture your thick skull. We can call your mom and
tell her where we are," she added as she helped him out to her car.

Once they had called his mother, and were on the road to the local
hospital, Scully could not help herself. "It never ceases to amaze me,
Mulder, that you can cause yourself great bodily injury with the most
innocent objects. Even *I* could tell that beam was too low for you to
walk under it without ducking!" she concluded indignantly.

"Well, if you have been there, Ms. Smartypants, maybe you could have
pointed that out to me *before* I hit my head!" he retorted.

Her eyes suddenly clouded over. "Exactly when did you hit your head,
Mulder?"

"I don't know. It was after four, I think. I remember I was getting
pretty hungry and I was going to grab a pizza around five or so. Why?"

"Were you unconscious the entire time? That means you were out for over
14 hours, Mulder! You more than likely *did* sustain a skull fracture,"
she said, not bothering to hide the concern in her voice.

"I woke up once, but I couldn't get up. He wouldn't let me," Mulder
said, closing his eyes to the bright sunlight pouring in through the
windshield.

"Stay awake!" she warned, shaking him lightly on the shoulder. "Who
wouldn't let you get up?"

"My father. He wouldn't let me get up. He said I was hurt and I should
just lie there and be still. He kept his hand on my shoulder the whole
time we were talking," Mulder said, completely oblivious to the response
his partner was having to his statement.

"Mulder," Scully said gently, "your father is dead. Don't you remember?"

"Of course I remember, Scully! I was there when he died. But we still
had some things he wanted to talk about, I guess. We had a talk. Then I
passed out again. When I woke up, you were threatening me with ambulance
rides."

Scully looked over at her partner, her eyes dark with worry. "I'm going
to recommend a complete CAT scan, Mulder. And I think you should stay
overnight, for observation. That was a really nasty bump you took there.
It may have jostled some things that shouldn't be jostled."

"Scully! You saw your father after he died. Why is it so unusual that I
would see my father? Well, actually I only heard him, I never really saw
him. How come it was unexplained phenomenon to you and it's a
manifestation of a head injury to me?"

"Mulder," Scully said, still keeping her voice soft and low, "I had a
*good* relationship with *my* father. You had a *terrible* relationship
with *your* father."

"All the more reason why we needed to talk, Scully. We left a lot of
things unsaid. But I'll let them x-ray me, CAT scan me, stick me and
whatever. I know how you like to see me being tortured by medical
science. You have a real streak of the Spanish Inquisition in you, Dana
Katherine Scully, you know that?"

Scully ignored the last remark. "Do you feel better about your father,
Mulder?"

"Yeah, Scully, in a weird way, I really do," he said honestly.

"Then it was worth it," she said flatly as she pulled into the emergency
room parking area.

"Yeah, I guess you could say that," he answered.

the end Vickie

"Stand up for what is right-- even if you stand alone" from a poster

Comments to:Vickie Moseley <mailto:vmoseley@fgi.net>